General Arcade and Retro Chat - Insert Coin -

rubadub

o1s1n wrote: »

Never bid before the last 10 seconds of an auction, you're just over inflating the price.

Throw down your max bid at the very end, I usually try 3 seconds if I'm on a good connection.

There is sniping software to do this for you, lets you select the time. I think 3 seconds is too close as you could have been outsniped.

The software allows you to schedule lots of auctions, and apply logic, like if you win one auction it will cancel the rest of them, which you have yet to even place a bid on anyway. If you win one auction you might automatically want to increase or decrease the bids on another upcoming auction.

This is an old lengthy post I had about it, some bits might be out of date, e.g. I do not know about the cancellation process anymore.

rubadub wrote: »

I simply avoid bidding wars, I bid in the closing moments so nobody has time to enter a counter bid when they are outbid. There is no real way to know how much I have truely saved on an individual auction, but if you know how to read auction histories you can see what typically happens. People get caught up in bidding wars.

How I figure I have saved is by checking out completed listings- another little known ebay tool.

If you do a search you can go to advanced and select "completed listings" this shows all the auctions for the item you want that were sold in the last month. Now you can see "the going rate", especially for high volume items, such as memory cards. You might see that the going average is €50, while many may go for €40, some €60. So if you win your auction for €40 you know you got a better than average deal.

Many people will not use ebay properly at all, they do not realise it is proxy bidding, they think the bid they put in will appear right away and must pay it. Some do realise it is proxy but STILL do not use it right, they do not put in their TRUE maximum.

Say you start a auction for a new bike, starting bid must be €50, the bikes shop value is €500. The ONLY reason I would bid at this stage is to stop you cancelling the auction. If there are no bids you can cancel at any time.

So I do not bid my max, but I do it with good reason. I bid €100 and you now cannot (easily) cancel the auction. My true max is say approx €400. Instead of bidding €50 I might go €100, for a good reason too.

I bid €100, but the current price is €50. Now another bidder comes along and typically will bid €55, not his true max, you can see this in many histories, though harder these days. Now he is instantly outbid as I am €100. He goes up in increments, loves the buzz of not knowing. Then he hits €100, I still outbid him. Now he might go €105 and be the highest bidder, and is delighted.

If I left it at an opening bid of €50, and he scored at €55, I figure he is now more likely to put his TRUE max in, as the bid is very low and he has not gotten any fun out of the auction, and sees he is likely to be outbid. But going to €105 he thinks he is really in a good bidding war, and is winning.

If I go €110, he will likely go €115, or higher. So I leave it. Most will go check on the auction to see what is happening. It may be days from finishing.

Now I go in and bid in the last few seconds, I bid €405 (not €400) in the last few seconds. Now he has NO TIME to react with a counter bid.

Many people put round figures in too, that is why I would pick €405, not €400. It is more likely somebodys max is €400, and if they had time they would say, "ah, 400 was my max, but I will go the extra tenner", but they have no time.

This bidding is called sniping, and ebay are against it since they lose out on profits, because the buyer ends up getting it cheaper.

Some do not think it is fair, but only those people who have used ebay incorrectly! it is stated in ebays rules/guidelines, enter your max, YOUR TRUE MAX.

If you get pissed off because you got sniped on an item at 405, when your bid was 400, then you cannot complain about anything, if you really were willing to "go the extra tenner", then why not do it from the start.

I have seen powersellers selling 10 identical items, most starting at €40, they also had 5 of the exact same items as buyitnow for €50. Yet I have seen people get caught up in bidding wars and ended up paying €60!

I get sniped all the time myself too, you will be outbid by a small increment, say €5, but that does not mean if you went €10 more that you would have got it for that, you do not know the other guys true maximum, it could be €100 more. If I did have time I might throw the extra tenner on and lose, this forces the other sniper to pay more. Ebay & the seller win, the bidder loses out.

rubadub wrote: »

Sniping also protects you from the seller himself, if he does choose to have a 5 min extention (if it does get offered in the future), then he can have a mate bid an extra euro to try and squeeze more out of you. This is called shilling.

This is the site I used to use, dunno if it is still any use
https://snip.pl/

The Last Bandit

Cake of Tremendous Power wrote: »

EmuParadise has ceased distributing roms.
I know theres a million other places to get such files but EP was one of the best in its field:o

:(

Was a decent site alright and had great nointro sets.

Doge

megaten wrote: »

I already have a vita put the sticks make me nervous of putting it loose in a bag and I was thinking of just getting a cheap psp go so I wouldn't have to worry about it breaking.
Just after reading psp slims can be charged via USB? I might just get one of those if I can't get a psp go cheap.

I'd still say go with a vita. I bought this case for like and it protects it really well.

https://m.ebay.co.uk/itm/Black-EVA-hard-Carry-Case-for-PS-Vita-PlayStation-Vita-Slim-/151624220649

Funnily enough I was playing Kula World the other day on the Vita via the adrenaline app and it black screened on me!

Had to hard reset the Vita and now all my applications are corrupt! The only thing that seems to run is the henkaku app.

Not sure what happened there!

Inviere

Cake of Tremendous Power wrote: »

EmuParadise has ceased distributing roms.
I know theres a million other places to get such files but EP was one of the best in its field:o

Wow, that's a big name to drop out. Fear of the big N's unlimited power budget has made operating big rom sites quite risky these days it seems. For me it's a double edged sword; on one hand, I'm with Nintendo in shutting down big sites which distribute roms and make a ton of cash while doing it via ads etc. On the other hand however, the majority of people who possess the where-for-all to download emulators and roms aren't going to be the ones handing Nintendo €10 per rom anyway, so it's a big of a waste of time. Secondly, the monetary amounts they're suing for are just absurd (something like $150k per rom)...that's just wrong.

o1s1n

rubadub wrote: »

There is sniping software to do this for you, lets you select the time. I think 3 seconds is too close as you could have been outsniped.

Yeah I've tried sniping software over the years, but gave up on it when I realised it was taking some of the fun out of ebay. I actually actively enjoy sniping

3 seconds is perfect as it means non sniping types (so those people who enjoy incremental bids for whatever reason) have zero time to get the next increment in, wiping them out. As long as your internet connection is up to the task of course!

If someone also comes in at the last few seconds with a snipe bid too that's higher than yours then you were going to lose out either way. You shouldn't be sniping with an aim to increase your bid to beat another snipe, your snipe should be one shot with your maximum bid at the very end and that's it.

One thing I find amazing about ebay is the psychology of bids drawing in more bids. I've seen so many items over the years that will end, be relisted, end etc with no bids - as soon as one person decides to bid you suddenly have one or two other bidders. It's like the bid acknowledges the value to everyone. This is the danger of bidding too early too.

...

I suddenly have an urge to hit ebay

DaveyDave

The bids drawing in other bids is what pisses me off. People bidding £2, £3, £4 on the likes of Shenmue. It's always high feedback sellers, scratching each others backs I presume.

The auctions I'm looking at already have a ton of bids so I'm likely going to take a loss on most of the stuff, annoying as I'd prefer to get a strong bid in and just get the stuff rather than play the waiting game checking email notifications but I've seen some stuff go for absolutely stupid money recently.

I have some backup listings if they fall through though, also annoys me about the flood of bidders because there's other listings and it's likely these will exceed the cost of the buy it now stuff already up.

rubadub

o1s1n wrote: »

3 seconds is perfect as it means non sniping types (so those people who enjoy incremental bids for whatever reason)

I would always go higher than the default setting in sniping software, if someone comes in a second later with the same max as yours then you win. 3 seconds is very short, there is time needed for someone to place the bid and then verify the bid. When I used to do it manually it took a long time. It might be faster these days though.

DaveyDave wrote: »

rather than play the waiting game checking email notifications ....

I have some backup listings if they fall through though

That is the beauty of the ability to line up loads of auctions, with advance planning on which to cancel. You can do it calm & collected. Then just forget about it. I remember I used to have alarms on my phone and be running to a PC to get a bid in. With the software I just just forget about it.

You also have to be careful looking at finished auctions, nowadays they have "sold" and "completed listings". I am not sure if sold really means it is always sold. In the past it was only completed listings which people presumed sold if they were in green text. I learned this was not the case, a pulled auction was "complete" but not sold at the price.

Before I learned this I was kicking myself -I was often looking for concert tickets and they were seemingly selling for next to nothing. In reality they had low bids and were pulled early, this was especially happening with concert tickets as they were going to be useless in a few days time, and sellers might have found other buyers offline.

Steve X2

Private sites are definitely the way to go for Roms and whatnot these days.

Inviere

Steve X2 wrote: »

Private sites are definitely the way to go for Roms and whatnot these days.

As in private torrent sites? Or invite/access only non torrent websites?

CiDeRmAn

Steady on lads and lassies.
While not against the charter we are surely skimming the edges here.

um7y1h83ge06nx

A bit of chat about that on IGNs latest Nintendo Voice Chat podcast.

Nintendo are really fighting against the tide there. With EmuParadise it was individual ROMs. Plenty of other places that will allow you download every game for a console in one go.

Touch Fuzzy Get Dizzy

megaten wrote: »

I already have a vita put the sticks make me nervous of putting it loose in a bag and I was thinking of just getting a cheap psp go so I wouldn't have to worry about it breaking.
Just after reading psp slims can be charged via USB? I might just get one of those if I can't get a psp go cheap.

Can you not get a hard case for it? I'm wary of it too but have mine since around 2014, part of it though is I actually have a strap on it because I'm a bit clumsy.
Hard case works great though

Steve X2

Inviere wrote: »

As in private torrent sites? Or invite/access only non torrent websites?

There's only one site i use. I of course won't link it here, but it isn't the normal sort of site you'd come across on a google search.

Tom Mann Centuria

Steve X2 wrote: »

There's only one site i use. I of course won't link it here, but it isn't the normal sort of site you'd come across on a google search.

How do you Google it, and discuss it here on boards without breaking the charter? Darn you boards, gosh darn you to heck.

Inviere

Tom Mann Centuria wrote: »

How do you Google it, and discuss it here on boards without breaking the charter? Darn you boards, gosh darn you to heck.

From the Charter:

Charter wrote:

NO LINKING TO ROM SITES

So it seems once you don't link to sites (common sense really), or otherwise assist people in finding such sites, it's all good.

Roms.

CathalDublin

a quick google for .....

megaten

Touch Fuzzy Get Dizzy wrote: »

Can you not get a hard case for it? I'm wary of it too but have mine since around 2014, part of it though is I actually have a strap on it because I'm a bit clumsy.
Hard case works great though

I just dislike how much thickness cases add even them slim ones. Plus I have an oled Vita and there aren't many cases. Maybe I should just get a second vita I don't care about getting damaged.

CathalDublin

Last edited by CiDeRmAn; Today at 10:19. Reason: Nopedy nope!

booo, that didn't break the charter, it didn't even mention rom

CiDeRmAn

CathalDublin wrote: »

booo, that didn't break the charter, it didn't even mention rom

CathalDublin

CosmicSmash

I wonder will all the fake Pokemon and SNES carts on eBay be next. I thought that would have been their first port of call. It would probably be harder to stop sales through AliExpress but surely it wouldn't be too hard on eBay.

KeRbDoG

Looking for some suggestions - I bought a iCade 60in1 board for one of my Dino King cabs without thinking that its vertical and I can't run that cab in vertical with a good bit of hacking of the cab which I'm not gonna do.
Ideally aiming for a low number multi board (not a Pi), the best I've found is a Taito 70in1.

Any other suggestions?

CathalDublin

KeRbDoG wrote: »

Looking for some suggestions - I bought a iCade 60in1 board for one of my Dino King cabs without thinking that its vertical and I can't run that cab in vertical with a good bit of hacking of the cab which I'm not gonna do.
Ideally aiming for a low number multi board (not a Pi), the best I've found is a Taito 70in1.

Any other suggestions?

I've tried the pandora box 3 and its got very bad screen tearing in horizontal games, I'm not sure if the 5 is better.
The price of that Taito board, why not run the arpicade? Mine boots to just my favourites so the list isn't huge.

KeRbDoG

Bounced that person a mail to see what options they might have - wanted to stay away from a Pi as I just foresee the need for lots of configuration which I wanted to avoid. Plug'n'Play baby! etc.

CiDeRmAn

What about a cheap PC, just load it with the classics and off you go.
Easy to configure as well

DaveyDave

Further to the bids I've been placing on eBay, the seller has Bart Vs The Space Mutants for example. Currently around €21 in bids, and there's two CIB buy it now for less. I don't understand why people are racking up the bids.

Also when checking the sold listings this seller seems to have recently sold a lot of the same items. It's possible they're relisted, but surely not that many? Having the same problem with House of the Dead on Saturn, keep getting emails notifications of the same seller listing the game after it selling.

Inviere

^^ fake bidders, drive up price, hence resisted items as they’re never actually sold in the first place

KeRbDoG

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

What about a cheap PC, just load it with the classics and off you go.
Easy to configure as well

Have all the bits to do that already but still look for plug/play'ness - the Taito 70in1 is looking like better idea.
Have a pandora in another cab, not a fan of the forced intro crap. Don't want/need newer titles. The auld 60in1 would have been awesome...there is a 17in1 but a chunk of those titles need two sticks which this cab won't have.

The search continues!

CathalDublin

KeRbDoG wrote: »

Bounced that person a mail to see what options they might have - wanted to stay away from a Pi as I just foresee the need for lots of configuration which I wanted to avoid. Plug'n'Play baby! etc.

I've seen some nice videos of the ArcadeSD too, its menu system is attract mode(same as Arpicade)
The arpicade software has come a long way since the first release, generally just resize your SD while creating it from the image, set your monitor resolution - default is usually OK, set your shortkeys exit/credit and then just add the roms you want, I admit, it did take me a couple nights to get it up and running in the early days but recently I wiped my setup and installed the latest version and it only took me a couple minutes to get it up an running, longest bit was waiting on the romlist to generate

I'm adding a link to Deezers/arpicade homepage https://arpicade.com/

Touch Fuzzy Get Dizzy

megaten wrote: »

I just dislike how much thickness cases add even them slim ones. Plus I have an oled Vita and there aren't many cases. Maybe I should just get a second vita I don't care about getting damaged.

I guess? Pretty expensive option imo.
I got a set like this https://www.bigbeninteractive.com/bigben-products/gaming-accessories/essential-pack-psvita
It's not a small handheld so it'll be a bit extra bulky, can't have it all ways, I dunno what other ideas to give, sorry. Hope you get sorted with something that suits